Microstructure and Mechanical Properties of AZ91D Alloy by Three Types of Forging Process

Abstract

Forging processes, such as liquid forging, rheoforging and thixoforging process, were used in this study as an effective method for manufacturing high-strength, finely-dispersed and highly-uniform AZ91D alloy parts. It has been found that although the microstructures of the three forging parts are all composed of α-Mg and β-Mg17Al12 phases, their shapes, sizes, numbers and distributions are all different, which also influences their mechanical properties. The tensile fracture morphologies were observed and their energy spectrums were analyzed by scanning electron microscopy. The results show that the cracks are mainly originated from the brittle fracture of the β-Mg17Al12 eutectic phases, whereas their fracture morphologies are greatly different, which indicate the direction for providing a reasonable forging process.